So after watching an episode of ‘The Great British Bake off’ I was practically drooling everywhere, I really wanted to try a more unusual dessert. Now, I am not sure if this counts as unusual but let me explain, when I make puddings and desserts I usually just make a simple sponge cake because it’s easy, and simple to make. When I thought about making this I thought it would have been really difficult but actually, it wasn’t! So for me this is something different, hence it’s unusual to me….

Anyway, this is soooo delicious, even just the white chocolate truffle filling on its own I could eat it’s so good! It also does not require many ingredients, and if you are a baker you are likely to have this all in your kitchen.

Ingredients

For the bases;

– Butter (to grease)

– 3 eggs

– 100 g castar sugar

– 100 g self-raising flour

For the white chocolate sauce;

– 250 g white chocolate

– 50 g castar sugar

– 5 egg yolks

– 425 mL double cream

Step 1: Chop the white chocolate into small chunks, and put the castar sugar for the white chocolate into a pan with 5 tablespoons of water and heat up until the sugar has dissolved and it starts to boil. This is a syrup, and should be added to the white chocolate whilst hot. Add the egg yolks to this mixture and mix all together. I had difficult getting the chocolate to melt so I put some water in a pan and the bowl on top to heat it up, but you have to be careful, not sure if anything would happen to the eggs so take your time and it will all melt. Pour the double cream into another bowl and stir it until it leaves a trail.

Step 2: Next you want to fold the two mixtures together so slowly add the cream to the other bowl and fold as you add it. There will be a lot of this mixture, and once it is all folded together (see right) you want to cover the bowl in clingfilm and place in the fridge to cool. I left it in the fridge for about 3 hours, it needs to be spreadable yet not completely set so that you cannot spread it.

Step 3: Preheat the oven to 190 °C (gas 5). Brush the bases of 2 cake tins, and stick baking paper to it. Whisk the 3 eggs and castar sugar together and sieve the self-raising flour and fold the mixture, to try and get as much air as possible. It doesnt look like a lot of mix to split between the two tins bt it rises well, so make sure it completely spreads over the tin and both of them have roughly the same amount of mixture. Place in the preheated oven for 20 minutes until golden and leave out to cool.

Step 4: Now comes the good part! You’re white chocolate should be set enough so that you can turn it upside down over your head and you don’t get covered in it (You don’t have to do that but its funny for everyone if you do and it goes wrong ). Place one of the bases on a plate and essentially smother it in the sauce, its likely it will run everywhere, you can place the sauce in the freezer for a while to speed up the cooling, but you should be able to paste it on. Once you have covered the first base place the second one on top, and do the same. I was not looking for presentation, so I poured it all over to completly coat it all! And I must say, divine!

So that is how you make a white chocolate truffle torte! I placed this finished product in the freezer so it set and served chilled, and it can be stored in the fridge for up to 3 days! Most of the ingredients for this I already had so this did not cost me a lot at all which is always good, and if you were to buy these ingredients from a shop there would be plenty leftover to make other desserts and cakes.

So this week for us is freshers week! For many Universities the next few weeks will be hectic. From people moving into new houses or halls, to supermarkets being packed with parents frantically buying their son/ daughter food like it’s the beginning of the apocalypse, and that is not even the worst part! To be fair, I am not surprised that parents get their child to stock up on food, likelihood is they will not last long in the first week if they didn’t get anything. It is after all the advantage of having your parents visit so make use of it.

This week is typically notorious for being primarily alcohol driven but also with the hope of trying to comfortably settle everyone into a new environment. It can be a difficult period meeting a bunch of strangers, but most Universities put on plenty of activities during both the day and night so people starting their first year need not be worried. And even if you are someone who does not drink alcohol then you can still have just as much fun at the events put on and not all are related to alcohol so don’t worry about that.

But as a second year now, I don’t think I have a different outlook on freshers because I am a second year, but I feel so different maybe because I have aged? Let me give an example, if someone asked me to go out into town with them for a night out 99% of the time I would tell them I am busy or have plans because the truth is I just want to eat a pizza and watch a film in bed, maybe some Ben & Jerry’s ice cream (which I only recently had for the first time).

Personally, I think the idea of it wears off after a while and it becomes more of chore. But what do I know? Maybe I am doing it wrong! :L

Every year they seem to be trying to improve the FRESHERS EXPERIENCE, to make it memorable. When I first came we heard students opinions, these were 3rd, 4th year students and they all mentioned that their freshers experience was the best part of Uni!

If I am being completely honest I am not sure where I am going with this…infact I think I will just summarise my points below…

1. Freshers is starting this week

2. Supermarkets are packed this time of year, avoid them at all cost.

3. I like a pizza with all the meats on it and of course stuffed crust, a film and bed!

This week I thought I would share my spaghetti bolognese! Its really quick unless you are a slow cook like me…..and, for the first time I used quorn mince! Thought I would give the vegetarian version a go, mainly because I saved £2 by just buying the veggie option! :O (a whole £2! That’s so much!!!!).

Anyway, more about all that after;

Ingredients:

– 500 g bag of frozen quorn mince

– As much spaghetti as you usually like

– 2 cartons of passata

– 1 onion

– Olive oil

– 3 carrots

– Bacon (I used 12 rashers, but it depends how much bacon you want in it)

– Garlic Ciabatta

– 200 mL beef stock

– Cheese

– 2 cloves of garlic

Step 1: Chop the garlic, carrots and the onion. Cut the bacon, I remove all of the fat of the bacon so I probably lose about a quarter of what I could put in, I also used 12 rashers because I was making this in bulk!

Step 2: After chopping the vegetables, place the frozen quorn mince into a large saucepan with some olive oil, you do not need to defrost it, you cannot really overcook it and it takes about 12 minutes from frozen to cook. Whilst this is being done, fry the bacon until cooked. Once done add the onion and fry this for a further 5 minutes until the onion is soft and brown, you can then add the carrots after on their own to soften them up slightly or, like me, you can add the quorn mince, carrot and garlic all in one go to the bacon and onion.

Step 3: After a further 5 minutes or so, *add the stock and passata to the mix and mix all together, bring to the boil and allow to simmer for as long as you would want (max 2 hours) all you are doing here is heating everything up, but I tend to let it simmer for about an hour.

*Note – before adding the stock and passata you can add some white wine and allow this to boil off before adding the stock, its not completely necessary.

Step 4: About 10 minutes or so before you have finished step 3, cook your spaghetti and your garlic ciabatta (190 °C for 12 minutes approx), and once all done serve and top with cheese if you like! With this there was also a lot of the bolognese left over, so I put that in a container for freezing, probably enough for 4 more portions, I didnt have portion sized containers so I will either be having big portions or when defrosted half will be stored in the fridge for the next day, when cooking this once defrosted you should add a small amount of beef stock (or just normal water) just to stop it all burning and cook it for about 10 minutes then its ready to go!

My first year at Uni I would always be making this, I never used quorn mince before but I feel like its such a better alternative, for the same amount as lean beef mince (for the fridge) you save £2, you therefore have no rush to use it. Also, this seems to absorb the flavour a lot better than lean beef. In terms of ‘does it taste different?’, not at all! Maybe if it was on its own but in something like this you don’t taste the mince, its just the tenderness that’s different. Whilst I am personally not a vegetarian I will most certainly be using this to what I previously have been doing.

This all cost under £10 with a few bits leftover for other dishes and with more portions for the freezer so this is definitely worth it if you are on a budget yet want something different.

So….I only just realised but it has been like almost a month since I last posted…..thats not good! I would say I have been too busy to spare 30 minutes here and there to write some posts but the truth is I havent been overly busy! My bad! haha

Although, a lot has happened in the last month, I have finished my research at the lab. I am currently writing the report for it which is annoying and stressful, mostly because I had no idea of what was going on! But I think thats the same with most research…..but I hope that it will be out of the way before 2nd year!

I went away for a week, it was only Wales….but I think it was good to just get away and spend time with friends, relax and not have to worry about anything. The amount of time spent on Pokémon was probably too much but it was soooo good :L (and yes! I love Pokémon! I grew up with it so…..thats my valid excuse)

I have also moved into my new place at University!!!!! Its so good! My room is like 3 times bigger compared to my University halls and im not paying anywhere near what I was for the tiny room that I did have! I have to say though, do not sign a contract for a house where the house was not lived in by anyone the previous year….so by that I mean that there were no occupants before me and my mates moved in here. The rooms have the old damp smell that accumulates because it has not been lived in, its a smell thats getting on my clothes which is not good! So most of my time since moving in has been spent trying to get rid of that and it wasn’t the cleanest of places, lots of dust…..PLUS THE SPIDERS!!!!!!!!!!! I have already located 5 spiders that seem undisturbed, thankfully not in my room. Did however see the biggest spider I have probably ever seen in my life (not including the zoo…), you could see its legs from a distance it was that big…..anyway that spider is no longer with us (sorry spider lovers, but it had to go).

So yea, a lot has happened but not a lot has happened at the same time! Hopefully over the next few weeks I will be able to get back into posting more regurlary, it is sometimes difficult to write posts but I thankfully have the recipe posts I can always do so I should have no excuse!

Anyway im going to go now….and my next post will actually be a recipe one :L

This post, has to say the least, been difficult to write. I am not sure why exactly, but this has been a really big deal for me! So some people don’t fully understand what self esteem and self confidence is, basically it is a feeling of doubt in what you do, what you think as a person and it is easily affected by many things. That is what I understand it to be anyway.

I first want to say that I in no way think my experience of this is greater than others, fully understand some people have different experiences and in some cases worse ones . And I wanted to briefly share my experience and what I plan to do about it, because I am taking action. Well, I want to.

My self confidence means I do not like trying new things, I always overthink things and play out scenarios in my head thinking of the worst possibilites. I feel like I cannot move on in life until it comes to a point where I feel comfortable doing something, aware of the consequences, but still enjoying myself. Because I simply cannot enjoy myself and ‘live life to the full’! I want to be able to try new things, experience new places in my life. It’s weird, just trying to put it into words is so difficult!

An example of my self confidence is this very blog. I think only a handful of my friends are aware of this blog, I have chosen to not share it with all of my friends because in my mind I believe that my ‘friends’ will put me down about it with negative comments, like I say I play out the worst scenario and I believe this to be it.

I think societal pressures have caused people to have bad self confidence. Like, if we do something different that is not us (like me and this blog) then people look at you funny or say something negative, and that kind of thing would put me down and prevent me from doing anything else.

In societies defense, some people can be really supportive of what you do in life! I actually have told a few friends about my blog and plans for YouTube and they have been really supportive and encouraging. These are friends who do matter to me and this has definitely increased my confidence about making YouTube videos and making this blog no longer an anonymous blog. Even if YouTube does not work out, I will feel better knowing that I had tried something new and different.

I think to overcome this I want to make YouTube videos. That way, I am not just showing myself to my friends (If they happen to find my videos) but also everyone else. I sat infront of the camera and was filming my first video and I was shaking really bad and I was sooooo nervous, because I was thinking of what could be said, what could be thought of me, and is what I am doing really right? Just writing this, I am overthinking about if it’s right, like I want to post it but I don’t want to post it and it is unbelievably annoying me and I want to get past that feeling.

So that is my plan, for the upcoming future. I definitely think this is the right step forward for me. Anyone experiencing self confidence/ esteem issues should try and think about what they currently have in their life. Then think if all of that makes you happy and content, now you know there is something missing, it might be something you would never think of or it could be something simple. Mine was that I watch an excessive amount of YouTube and always wanted to do it, but I never have, until now. I am also going to take up running because I feel about unsure of my body image, but I want to mainly do it to help clean my mind and use the time spent to think about everything and feel positive. People say running is good, so I am gonna try it!

Try not to think you are someone who is little, stand tall and proud with a postive attitude and a positive outlook on life. Tidy your surroundings, clear junk out, start afresh and anew.

What are your experiences of this and is there any other way you might suggest to help overcome it and have better self confidence? Let me know

This week we made lasagne. It was actually my first time making this, I tend to just go for a simple pasta bake however I thought I would try something new.

Okay, the ingredients;

– 1000 g lean beef mince

– 200 mL hot beef stock

– about 3 tablespoons olive oil

– a block of cheese

– lasagne sheets (standard box of about 500 g will be more than plenty for this)

For the tomato sauce;

– 2 onions

– 2 garlic cloves

– 2 tbsp tomato purée

– 200 mL white wine (I use blossom hill a small bottle (187 mL) they only cost about £2)

– 1200 g tinned chopped tomatoes (3 x 400 g tins)

For the white sauce we used Dolmio cheesy white sauce simply to save time, and we have never made white sauce before, plus this was cheaper…they had an offer on!

LET’S GET TO IT!!!

Step 1: Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a pan and add the chopped onion and garlic. Cook until brown and soft. Then add the tomato paste, cook for a little longer whilst stirring continuously. Add the wine like you are a true italian! I believe it is italian to add wine to dishes like this, I hope that is not offensive….It is also tradition for the french to drink wine whilst cooking! That I can say because I am half french…but I diagress. So the wine is added, you need to bring to the boil and allow it to reduce, it takes about 5 minutes. After this add the tinned tomato and allow to simmer for 20 minutes.

Step 2: During this time you need to a) prepare the beef stock, and b) brown the mince meat for about 10 minutes. This is where timing comes in! When all of that is done, combine the tomato sauce, the beef stock and the mince meat together. Bring to the boil and simmer for 30 minutes.

Step 3: Preheat oven to gas mark 4 (approx 180 degrees centigrade), oil a dish then in this order add layers of meat, lasagne sheets, white sauce, and repeat 2 more times so you have 3 layers of each and the top is topped with white sauce. After this you can add your cheese to the top. We opted for normal cheddar cheese, but you usually use mozzarella strands. We also decided to use the entire block because we are cheese lovers and cheese is the best invention. After this place in the oven for 45 minutes until lightly browned.

After this has cooked you have an amazing lasagne which I thoroughly enjoyed eating, it was delicious and there were leftovers with 4 of us eating it! Easily 6 portions there, so they could be frozen for later and cooked from frozen by just doubling the cooking time above. It’s very likely I will be doing another italian dish….I just love italian food! This was all purchased from morrisons for just a little over £15, with some things left over and just from this to get 6 decent portions I would definitely say it’s is good value for money!

I just checked today and in total I have had 200 visitors to my blog, as of this post! And tomorrow it will be 1 month since I started it. I would just like to say, whilst it is difficult to post on a more regular basis, sometimes you get bunches of posts from me in one go then none for a week! I really do appreciate all the support and people taking their time to look at my blog. So thank you x

This weekend is big for me! I think I said my last one was but this is definitely bigger! Last time I mentioned about starting a YouTube channel and that I was trying to film some videos. They did not go too great! I feel like I could have done them better and didn’t really plan them. People say you grow when doing videos and get better as time goes on which I hope will happen. However as I am anxious about doing it I feel like if I can get a decent video as my first it might make me feel more confident about continuing it all! So tomorrow I am filming….again….and hopefully, fingers crossed, it shall go better! I think it will

I have 2 new posts (apart from this one) coming up over the next week. The first one is another recipe which should be posted Sunday or Monday. The second is my self confidence post which should go up the middle of next week. I have been holding back on that one a little because I want to make sure its right :L

So far this week, I have actually progressed with labs, doing some new techniques for my project. I also went up to Manchester to move some things into my new place! Soon I shall be moving back up there which I am really looking forward to!

Anyway thats it for this one, I shall see you in a few days with another post

Sorry for the lack of these kind of posts, been a while since the last one.

Exams are a big part of your education unless you’re lucky to take a course that has no exams…hate them people (Jokes :P).

At University you are almost guaranteed to have less exams! That is for sure. You are very likely to have January season exams whereas at college, at least now, all exams are sat in the summer. I was lucky to be, I think, the final year allowed to sit January exams when taking A levels :L

Unfortunatley, most University exams are really long. Mine are all between 2-3 hours long. You will be surprised at how quickly that time goes. So you have less exams but longer ones, you might not know and this was certainly new for me, but you can actually leave the exam within a certain time period. You have to be there for the first like 15 minutes or so, and you are not allowed to leave 15 minutes before but anytime inbetween you can (Not sure about the exact times, but it depends on the length of the exam in the first place).

My experiences of exams at University for my first year have actually been good! In January I had one 3 hour exam, as my optional module consisted of 3 exams throughout the 1st semester (like midterms I believe). So, I think I had like 6 weeks to revise for it! I was pretty confident going into it….(not trying to sound cocky)….I am surprised at myself for not getting so stressed. If you recall from my posts related to stress that I am most certainly a stressful person when it comes to exams however I was not! It was definitely weird, although I cannot complain!

I think the thing to remember is the exams in your first year are there mainly to settle you in to Uni life, and to get you all up to the same level of knowledge as you will all have different backgrounds in that field.

When you go to University and you are about to sit exams, or you find out when they are, plan ahead. Most University courses are designed to be easily split down into smaller sections. For example, most of my modules were taken by 3 different lecturers on a different topic and so when revising for that exam. I could just learn 1 lecturers work, understand that before moving on. Planning ahead (a.k.a revision) allowed me to cover all the topics at a nice steady pace!

So, in summary… less but longer exams, its not all bad because they are only in the field you opted for. Try not to worry, they wont kill you as it’s only first year. Revision should be easy because the modules could be broken down into smaller separate sections.

Leave a comment to tell me about your experience of exams! What do you think of them? Do you prefer alternative methods of examination? Do you worry about them?

A few days ago I made Calzone’s with my friend. So, I thought I would make a post for it and show you guys how to make them! (It’s really easy, just fold the pizza in half….. but let’s make a long post about it! :O yay!)

So, the ingredients…

For the dough;

225 g plain strong flour

90 mL milk*

50 mL water*

1 sachet yeast

25 mL olive oil

A pinch of salt

* The milk and the water, should technically be at room temperature, I don’t believe we allowed this to happen but it made no difference to our food!

For the filling;

Add whatever you want for the filling. We opted for mild cheddar cheese, a lloyd grossmon tomato and basil sauce thickened up with some tomato purée. We also added some chicken tikka, oven baked ham, and salami meat.

Step 1: Sieve the flour into a bowl, and in another bowl, mix together the water, the milk, and the yeast. Once done, make a well in the flour and add the mixture to the flour.

Step 2: Mix well and try to get as much air into the mixture as possible. Once you see the result in the picture to the left, flour the work surface and knead the dough for 5-10 minutes getting as much air in as possible. Whilst kneading the dough add the olive oil to the dough, just drizzle it on a bit at a time.

Step 3: After kneading the dough, return to the bowl (means less dishes when washing up :L), cover with clingfilm or a damp towel and put somewhere warm (we opted for the microwave as there was no room anywhere else). Leave for about 1-2 hours to rise, here are the before and after pictures;

Step 4: Add a pinch of salt, and knead the dough for a further 5 minutes. You then cut the dough up into smaller pieces, for reasonably sized calzones I would suggest 3 pieces. You can allow these to rise again if you wish, we did not. Also preheat oven to gas mark 8.

Step 5: Roll out the smaller pieces of dough and place on a baking sheet that is lightly floured so they can be removed easily. Leaving an edge, fill one half of your calzone with all your toppings, wet the edge and then fold over the empty half to stick. The dough should be thick enough so that the filling does not burst out, but not too thick that you cannot put a lot of filling in. If you are just doing a pizza just cover all the top with your filling. Place in the oven for about 8-12 minutes until golden. The calzone should be hard like a brick and not soft still. Leave to cool slightly and then enjoy

And that is how you make calzone’s and pizza’s, they were delicious! All of the ingredients were bought for under £10, we chose to buy them at Tesco. There are other alternative stores where this can all be bought. When buying the ingredients we tried to get the cheapest items with the best quality. There was also some flour left over, enough to repeat this recipe a few more times.

This week at work, nothing has greatly happened there. However this week I thought about maybe making some videos for YouTube, suggested by some friends, about Uni (things on this blog), life issues and like challenges. It’s not all sorted, and I am just trying it all out with the editing aspect and trying to film some decent videos and a few of them so I can upload them whilst at University and not need to worry.

I will let you know when and if I do upload videos, I have some reasons why I am unsure about doing this (which is actually part of a future post I want to write), but keep reading and I am sure I will be!

Also, I learnt if you want a temporary fire for a BBQ, put some marshmallows on the fire, it will create a big flame!!!!! (I had a BBQ :L)

And finally, I made calzones! I have a friend who is going University this September and I am ‘teaching’ her to make different foods, not neccessarily healthy but maybe something from scratch, batch foods, fun foods and cake! (cake gets its own mention). So I am going to be posting any meals I cook, start something new on here.

So on my blog there will be;

– Experiences through Uni (my first year)

– Weekly Updates

– Recipes

– Life issues

– (Starting Soon) Updates on Uni when I start 2nd Year

– And maybe YouTube videos we will see!

I will be posting the first recipe blog either tonight or tomorrow so keep a look out for that!